Sounds Almost Like Teen Spirit

Wrestling Themes That Sounded Too Close To Actual Rock Music

The 90s maybe twenty plus years away, a time with prehistoric internet speeds and one megabyte Playstation memory cards, but the music definitely wasn't in the dark ages. The arrival of grunge bands Nirvana, Pearl Jam and Stone Temple Pilots, to the Brit Pop of Blur and Oasis later in the decade meant music was in well and truly alive.

When a band creates a sound, someone out there will probably want to emulate it, usually being inspired to create an original song of their own.

However, this might not have been the case when it came to World Championship Wrestling (WCW). In the mid to late 90s wrestling was incredibly popular with the then World Wrestling Federation (WWF) battling WCW every Monday in the night in the USA TV ratings. Over here we had to catch it air late on Channel 4 or Sky.

WCW heard popular rock music and decided they wanted it for their wrestler’s entrance themes so they could make an impact on their way to the ring. Instead of paying to licence the use of well-known rock songs they decided to perform their own versions that came ever so close plagiarising the originals, being just different enough to avoid any legal action. The wrestlers themselves on the most part didn't usually have a say in their entrance music at the time.

Self High Five - Diamond Dallas Page

Diamond Dallas Page (DDP) was a high profile wrestler in WCW in the late 90s and very early 00s. His theme called Self High Five sounded so close to Nirvana's Smells Like Teen Spirit that Dave Grohl wasn't happy at all when he heard how similar it was.

One Crazed Anarchist - Chris Jericho

He may now be known as the ayatollah of rock and rolla but Chris Jericho's WCW entrance theme, sounds like a painfully out of tune version of Evenflow by Pearl Jam, with a few chords changed along the way. The now WWE who bought WCW in 2001 dub this theme out with Jericho's more popular theme "Break The Walls Down" on re-releases.

Not So Ironman - Vince Russo

Although not a wrestler, WCW's lead writer for a time in the late 90s and very early 00s Vince Russo had a part on air in WCW's shows. He's noted for several unpopular moments including booking himself to win the World Heavyweight title. However, his entrance music is a few chords short from sounding the same as Black Sabbath's Ironman and how they got away with this well, we'll never know.

It's Not Exactly Come As Your Are - Raven

Poor Nirvana were hit twice by slightly changed versions of their songs, the second was a song given to grunge inspired wrestler Raven, that sounds strikingly like Come As You Are. Had WCW licenced the original it would have suited Raven's often sorrow persona.

Welcome To The Dog Pound - Rick Steiner

One of the weirdest was wrestler Rick Steiner's theme Welcome To The Dog Pound which sounds like a badly performed opening riff of Guns N' Roses Welcome to The Jungle over and over again.

There were more theme's taken from popular rock music, but we'll save your ears at just five of them. The belief is the songs were changed just enough to get around legal action at the time. In today's world of Facebook and Twitter it's likely to think the outcome might have been different. WWE who would buy out WCW in 2001 now dub over the music with less controversial WWE produced music.

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